“The idea of not caring what people think means living for yourself and making decisions that will be beneficial to YOU, not to anyone else.”
In this post I explore Improv rule #7 on my list, “Getting out of your Head”. For those of you not familiar with this term as it relates to Improv, it’s the state of thinking so much in a scene it hinders your performance. It occurs when you realize you don’t know what to say and panic. The effects are obvious and visible: lowered response time, lack of scene progression, and horrible jokes. It’s a catastrophe.
As bad as “being in your head” is for Improv, same goes in life, business and relationships. We self doubt. We beat ourselves up. We think what we have is not good enough.
I’ll never forget my first experience with an “Internet troll”. Before I started blogging I was warned that there will be “trolls”, these people who lurk in the night and who are known to leave comments that are hateful and hurtful. I was told to set up the appropriate spam filters which should block most fictitious users, however, I took the note and prayed the trolls would stay away.
Flash forward to my very first blog post on January 5th, 2013 at 11:00am. I will never forget this day. Clicking “post” was thrilling, scary and amazing all at the same time. Most of all I was just so excited to share my passion with you.
At 1:00 AM the next morning, as I lay in bed hopelessly trying to fall asleep, I get an alert to my phone that another comment has been posted to my blog. I always get excited when someone posts, so I logged in right away . But this comment was different. As I read it, I felt my head start spinning and a wave of panic overcame me. I was reading some of the most hurtful, mean and hateful comments. I immediately logged in and deleted the comment. I then blocked the user from my site.
I immediately felt defeated. Scared. Upset. Hurt. Confused. I started to question myself, my blog, my mission, my passion … everything. One comment from a stranger had thrown me totally off course. I was so in my head and could not get out.
Of course I now realize that person is nothing to me. They are a troll, living online at 1:00 AM, trying to hurt other people and crush their dreams. But you know what? This troll actually gave me a gift … I am now stronger, more confident and even MORE sure of myself.
I learned some important lessons from that experience and want to share them with you:
1) Own your reaction – You can never control what other people will do or say, you can only control how YOU react. Never allow anyone to steal your peace, your passion or your confidence.
2) Pay attention to your thoughts – Listen to yourself, you will start to notice patterns. If you feel yourself going negative, stop yourself and immediately reverse the statement into a positive.
3) Surround yourself only with people that lift you higher – this says it all. Put people in your life that support and love you. When you are down, laser focus in on them.
4) Phone a friend – In the troll situation, the first thing I did was call someone that loves me. This person talked me off the ledge and put me right back on track.
5) Get busy – Do something, anything! Get your mind off the issue. Run, Read, Write, Shop – you’ll find that soon enough you are back to yourself. Life always goes on.
6) Be Grateful – Remember it could always be worse … you could be an Internet troll!
What are some things you do to stay out of your head?
Be well. Be Inspired!
Judi
Note from Judi: If you are on Twitter … follow the conversation by using #tribeholla
